Wheat varieties and technological change in Europe, 19th-20th centuries : New Issues in Economic History

摘要

Regarding the technological framework, the present article also offers both a solid result and a firm working hypothesis. First, it makes clear that wheat yields in Great Britain and elsewehere in Europe in the second half of the 19th and the first third of the 20th century are not strictly comparable because, as we have just seen, the wheat varieties developed in each region were very different. Second, the article also suggests that wheat breeding had to face more difficulties in the dry Mediterranean regions than in northern and central Europe, and that to a large degree this explains the low wheat yields in Spain